Native School

At what is now the railway crossing at the end of Marine Terrace there once stood the Native School, the first Aboriginal mission school in Western Australia. An examination of this mission gives insight into how early Europeans viewed and treated the Aborigines they encountered. In 1841, the Reverend George King established the school under the Church of England in a house loaned to him by the government. Its purpose was to educate the Aboriginal children of the region. King believed that he had a moral obligation to save the children from the “degrading habits of their bush life” so that they could become citizens in the new colonial society. While the students learned reading, writing, and trades, the main effect of the Native School was to disrupt their traditional way of life. Eighteen children were taken from their parents in the bush to be baptized into the Anglican Church and into a European way of life. Despite a severe lack of funds, the mission continued to operate until 1851. After ten years, the students were transferred to Perth to get away from the convict population which had been recently established.